


honesty

by fatalize



Category: Fruits Basket
Genre: Gen, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-27
Updated: 2017-07-27
Packaged: 2018-12-07 19:50:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,508
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11630679
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fatalize/pseuds/fatalize
Summary: Mayuko spots Shigure and Akito at a park. Shigure comes over to talk to her, and as the two talk casually about relationships new and old, Mayuko begins to put the pieces together of their shared past.Requested by an anon on tumblr.





	honesty

            She sees him unexpectedly—although when is his appearance ever expected?—while she’s sitting by herself at the park, a book open and resting on her crossed knees. He’s with someone, a person Mayuko’s never seen before, holding hands. A boy, she thinks, and finds herself unsurprised—but then looks a little closer, decides maybe they’re a girl—then gives up, decides it doesn’t matter. The thing that _does_ surprise her is the hand-holding, the shoulder-brushing, the fact that the smile on Shigure’s face seems to be _genuine_ , that there’s nothing calculated about the way he bends his spine, places his hands.

            Mayuko never knew Shigure could make such an expression.

            She doesn’t realize she’s staring until she sees him turn, almost imperceptibly, and he meets her eyes for about a second. The person he’s with doesn’t notice, and they walk a few more paces until he leans down to whisper something in their ear, points to something Mayuko can’t see on the other side of the park’s many trim-neat bushes, and the person walks out of sight. Mayuko quickly turns her attention back to her book and tries to read, but her eyes anxiously skim over the same line again and again and again until she feels his presence at her side, hears his cold and teasing voice:

            “Aah, if isn’t Mayu-chan~ what a surprise to meet you here!”

            She wonders for half a millisecond if she should lie, pretend she wasn’t watching—but she knows better by now.

            “So you got yourself a boyfriend, huh.”

            “I keep telling her she should grow her hair out. Although her short hair is cute, too.”

            “Before you tell other people what to do, shouldn’t you do something about yourself? At this rate your hair is gonna go past your shoulders. It doesn’t look good on you the way it does on Ayame.”

            He sits down next to her, and she groans internally. So much for a relaxing day at the park.

            “Are you jealous of her?”

            “Jealous?! Ha! As if.” She slams the book closed with perhaps unnecessary force, crossing her arms so all her limbs are a tight cross-hatch of protection. “I have Hatori, and for the record, he’s a _much_ better boyfriend than you.”

            “All according to plan,” he sings, and Mayuko’s a bit perplexed at this response. She uncrosses her arms, looks at him, but he’s looking off in the distance, daydream-eyes focused on something unknown to her.

            “You and your schemes. You can’t possibly think you had anything to do with me and Hatori.”

            “Oh, I don’t think. I know.”

            Mayuko rolls her eyes at this, decides not to pursue further. She knows the reason Hatori was in the bookstore that day _was_ because of Shigure—knows that even if he did nothing to stir feelings, he still nudged them together. She didn’t want to think about the extent of his plans beyond that, if there were any.

            “So does that girl know what a terrible schemer and person you are?”

            “She knows everything.”

            Mayuko lifts her head a bit in surprise, stares at him. Truth be told, she wasn’t expecting that at all. Then again, she wasn’t expecting that genuine smile from him earlier, either. And she feels a weight to that word, _everything_ —this girl must not be using Shigure in the way Mayuko was, to fill a sort of idle emptiness, to replace loneliness with tolerance. Did she want to know everything?

            “Are you being honest? It’s giving me the creeps.”

            “Ohh, Mayu, that hurts—I’m _always_ honest.”

            “Yeah? Then you mind telling me who she is? I don’t think it’s fair to keep your love life a secret from me.”

            “Ah, so you are jealous after all.” He grins slyly, and Mayuko decides to ignore that, letting him proceed. “Her name’s Akito. I’ve been in love with her for a long time.”

            “How long?”

            “Always.”

            _Always._

            Even when they were together, then? He was in love with this girl? This Akito?

            Again, she finds herself not angry with him, unsurprised. She almost expected this, like somewhere in her subconscious she knew his mind was always elsewhere, was never with her.

            Because as much as he gets on her nerves, she can’t dodge the fact that both of them were using each other—and now she realizes their situations were even more similar, as their union was a hopeless distraction in the face of seemingly-impossible unrequited love on both their sides.

            But now, on this end of things, they’re both with the people they originally desired. This happy ending her past self wouldn’t have imagined a few years ago—was it really possible because of him?

            He told her about the memory suppression technique. He told Hatori to go to her bookstore. He subtly urged her to chase her true feelings. Maybe he had always been—albeit obnoxiously—honest with her.

            But she’d die before she’d tell him she was grateful.

            “Well.” She stands, stretches, lifts her book above her head and arches her back. “I’m glad that you two are together now. Best wishes and all that, blah blah blah.”

            “You don’t want to know about her?”

            “I don’t give a crap about your love life.”

            “Swearing makes you unattractive, Mayu.”

            “Shut up. I’m not finished. I don’t give a _shit_ , but you seem…different. Happy. Your smile has a warmer color to it. It’s nice to know even idiots like you can fall in love and be cheerful.”

            This time Shigure is silent for once, staring at her slightly wide-eyed, and she immediately regrets her decision to say something nice. _He’s never gonna let me live this down_ , she thinks, turning away in embarrassment, but he stands, and suddenly his lips are at her ear, a low tone:

            “Thank you, Mayu. You’re amusingly kind.”

            And then he turns away, starts walking in the direction he came from, but she’s all riled up now so she shouts, “Wait!”

            He stops, looks back at her.

            She thrusts her finger out at him. “You do owe me an explanation! I saw your arm around her before! I’ve never seen you that close with anyone! What gives?”

            Shigure smirks one final smirk and says, “You’ll have to ask Hatori about that.” Then, before she can stop him, he continues to walk away.

            _“What does Hatori have to do with this?!”_ She shouts as she watches his figure retreat, disappearing behind the bush where Akito had disappeared behind earlier, two ghosts vanishing like midday fog.

* * *

             “I think he’s messing with me,” Mayuko says, agitatedly splashing water on her face in Hatori’s bathroom. Her lover is leaning on the doorframe, watching her, lip twitching into the smallest of smiles.

            “No. It’s me he’s trying to mess with. I should have told you by now—but it’s really a long story, one I’m not sure you’ll believe.”

            She grabs a towel, dries her face. “So Shigure being physically affectionate _does_ have to do with you?”

            When Hatori doesn’t respond right away, she puts down the towel and looks up at him, sees his head is tilted slightly and he’s eyeing the bathtub. Then, with a completely flat tone and expression, he asks, “If you found a seahorse, what would be your first instinct? To put it in fresh water, or sea water?”

            Mayuko stares at him, completely dumbfounded. “You Sohmas all speak in riddles, I swear.” A pause. Then, “If all I had was a bathtub, I guess fresh water. But they belong in the sea, don’t they?”

            Somehow, Hatori seems amused. He ruffles her hair, says, “Yes, you’re right, they do.”

            “Do you promise you’ll tell me tomorrow?”

            “I promise. I really shouldn’t have put it off this long—I suppose I was a bit afraid, still.”

            “You don’t have to be afraid with me,” Mayuko says, placing her palm on his arm, rubbing her thumb gently into his shirt sleeve. “You can tell me anything.”

            “I know.”

            And she still senses it, the slight hesitation and anxiety in him before he commits to putting his arm around her, holding her close. She assumed today that Shigure never touched her because, like her, his heart was somewhere else—but is there a larger story? Something else that haunts these two like a curse, rooted in their spines, wrapped around their souls like ivy?

            Mayuko can’t even begin to imagine. The explanation doesn’t seem like an easy one—and according to Hatori, it’s not.

            She glances up at him. Sees the blind eye that he keeps hidden behind a curtain of dark bangs like a secret, a cover for private feelings veiled from the outside world. Hatori is full of secrets, full or hurt, full of overflowing kindness. And because of this, whatever secrets he and Shigure keep from her don’t bother her, because she knows it’s not done with ill intent.

            She reaches up, brushes the hair away from his eye.

            There’s so much she never knew, and so much, now, that’s she’s ready to know.


End file.
